Exhibition at Neue Sächsische Galerie, Chemnitz , February / April 2017

Exhibition at Galerie Nord / Kunstverein Tiergarten Berlin in the frame of the European Month of Photography, October / November 2016

„one hour at the beach“, 8 photographies 75 X 50 cm, 2 photographies 180 x 120 cm„privatized“, 8 photographies 75 X 50 cm, 2 photographies 180 x 120 cm„targets“, 8 photographies 75 X 50 cm, 2 photographies 180 x 120 cm 

The exhibition comprises 3 series of 10 photographies that are dealing with social and political phenomena of Israel today. His themes are: the decay of the utopian vision of the first settlers, the way to treat ethnical and religious minorities and the neccessary absurdity of the israelian military. Ilan Nachum is dealing with these intricate, deeply ideologicaly and religiously rooted issues with great intelligence and ease, completely undogmatic and without any pathos. He virtously plays with the possibilties of documentary photography. Always keeping the necessary distance, his deep envolement in – and commitment to the photographed subject, life in israel, its problems, absurdities and beauty, is strongly perceptible.

Privatized

„… Kibbutz is an experiment that did not fail.“ Martin Buber In 2009 the Kibbutz movement celebrated its 100th anniversary. The long lasting and influentual utopian, socialist experiment started with the foundation of the first Kibbutz, Degania, in 1909. Over time it evolved and underwent changes, but its primary idea, the equality of all members, remaind, more or less, untouched. „From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.“ In the 1980s, with the privatization of the kibbutzim – different levels of income and private ownership – this primary quality begins to vanish. The loosening of the communal bonds in the Kibbutzim seems to go hand in hand with a change in the collective thinking of the Israeli society. In 2009 Ilan Nachum started a series of photographs, that, at first glance, document the typical housing of Kibbutzim. Underlyning the documentary appeal of the photographs is his use of similar angles and light situations, following the idea of the well-known german photographers Bernd and Hilla Becher: to define a type by the slight differences that become obvious when the objects are isolated and than aggregated in a sequence. Looking at the differences between the work of the Bechers and Ilan Nachum we find the core of his work „privatized.“ The Bechers document landmarks of a declining industry – connected with specific forms of technology and societies – that were often dismantled soon after they were photographed. Due to these circumstances the photographic representations become monuments of the photographed objects. Referent and sign fall in one. Ilan Nachum´s work is transcendent in a different way. His objects will remain. He is documenting a declining idea. He turns the usual iconography of the representation of life in a kibbutz – groups of children playing together, groups of people working together- upside down. The dwellings he photographs seem to be abandoned. The inhabitants that appear in a few of the pictures seem isolated and ghostlike in the bright light. In a strange but factual way the dwellings change their meaning from being representations and symbols of an egalitarian utopia to images of a classical suburban lifestyle.

One hour at the beach

This sequence shows the most crucial point of israeli social life: the coexistence of diffrent religious groups. The beach is a surrounding, where the social interactions of groups and individuals can be perfectly surveyed. It offers an almost neutral and empty space, in which the choice, where to settle yourself is determined by the relation towards others. The groups represented in the photogaphs are secular israelis and arabic muslims, easily identified by their divergent dress codes. Even when together, it is obvious, that there is no interaction between them. The art of Ilan Nachum shows people in an overwhelming and elementary set-up of beach, ocean and sunset. The chosen time – the sun has set and darkness sets in – is augmenting the existential expression of the work. The sheer beauty and intensity of the scenery integrates the various attitudes and shows people as they are: human beings enjoying and understanding life in respect to the elements of nature. Ideas of social or religious segregation seem vain.

Targets

This series is the most recent work of Ilan Nachum and it still is a work in progress. He has access to a restricted army district inside the Negev Desert, where he found constellations, that at first sight are reminiscent of landart pieces : strange constructions mounted on top of artifical hills, weird objects and circular arrangements. Placed within the wide and empty desert landscape they create a surrealistic impression, similar to the paintings of Dali or Tanguy. Looking closer at the objects an additional aspect comes into play: the objects are composed of scrap – military residue as well as refrigirators, metal bedframes, car parts, old barrels, etc. The objects are used as targets for the Israeli Air Force. They, in an almost touching way, are mimicking radar stations or rocket launches. The camera, as a documenting tool, is preserving a utilitarian fake, a manipulated reality. Layers of „The Real“ and the imaginary melt under the relentless desert sky.

The exhibition was supported by:       

Links:
Ilan Nachum
Neue Sächsische Galerie
Galerie Nord / Kunstverein Tiergarten

Video filmed at the opening,

29th of July, Kunstquartier Bethanien, Berlin

Silvia Beck, Laurence Egloff, Marco Goldenstein, Elke Graalfs, Anett Lau, Peter Nansen Scherfig, Veronika Schumacher, Wolf von Waldow, Dana Widawski

The ornament is back, back as wallpapers in fancy lofts, as filigree blinds in architecture and also back in the discourse of contemporary art. In the current art-production, two relations are particularly obvious: 1. Working with ornaments in their baroque function as space structuring elements relating architecture and art/design. 2.The deconstruction of ornamental structures that are looked upon as symbolic for opressive systems. In-between these formal and contentual, associative reference points – and beyond – there are  almost endless possibilities to access „The Ornament“ and its long history. For thousands of years, ornaments were defining the appearence and the spiritual message of buildings and objects of everyday and ritual use. They integrated the progress of philosophical, religious and geometrical-mathematical thinking into more and more complex structures and gave them visual presence. The formal means of rhythmics and recursion – used since the Stone Age – establish a connection of being human – pulse, birth, death – and cosmic processes. In the 20th century, the concept of structuring surfaces and intertwining them with ordinal systems finds a new surface in the observation of  corporative production and organisation.The ornament is less regarded as communicating stability and knowledge, but as a form incorporating force and power. Nowadays the ordinal system „Ornament“, formally and motivicly fractionalized, becomes the stage for the clash of systemic and individualistic thinking. Adopting the transcending concept of the ornament, while simultaneously transforming it subjectively, contemporary artists reestablish the ornament as an unconcerned, descretionary media. A media that makes it possible to connect images and tokens in new ways and structure walls and spaces. Silvia Beck, Veronika Schumacher, Wolf von Waldow Dana Widawski, Elke Graalfs, Marco Goldenstein Peter Nansen Scherfig, Dana Widawski

Silvia Beck

Dicionário de Dúvida, 2015 HD-video / screen, 02.32‘ Edition 1 + 3 by courtesy of Hafemann Internatiional

Laurence Egloff

Nr. 1, 2000, acrylic on canvas, 120 x 240 cm, Nr. 2 Perlmutt, 2000, acrylic on canvas, 120 x 150 cm

»Gekreuch«, 2014, Collage on wallpaper, 150 cm x 140cm

 Anett Lau

constructio, 2016, stencil print on wallpaper, Installation, 3 x 3 m

Völkerkunde, 2008, Giclé, refugee camp, 2010, digital print

       Geh doch, 2016, tile-painting, 31,5 x 318,5 cm, Marco Goldenstein on the right

Self Made, Putin mit seinem Beichtvater, Kill Animals, Diebische Elster,

Altes Spital, Arnstadt, October 2015

Some impressions of the second „Identities“ exhibition. It comprised the same artists as the earlier show at „Pavillon am Milchhof“, but it showcased additional works of Alexine Chanel, Viola Kamp and myself. For further informations, please scroll down and have a look at the exhibition at Milchhof, April 2015. A documentation of Alexine Chanels new work you find here: the calling

Photographies by Alexine Chanel Thanks to Christian, Andreas, Albrecht, Konstanze, Constance, Holger and all the voluntary helpers. The exhibition was supported by: Ilm-Kreis and 

Studio Haus am Lützowplatz June, July, August 2015

Ruprecht Dreher, Peter Freitag, Nicholas Kashian, HC Petersen, Oliver Ross, Marco P Schäfer

The exhibition „Paper Icons“ convenes six artists working within the material of paper under the theme „The Icon“.
 Within the pieces in this exhibition, there are two distinct approaches : Firstly, the re-combination or subsequent eradication of iconic signifiers using found materials. Secondly, the construction of signs with an iconic appeal using blank material. Both approaches work with the deconstruction of the icon as a common signifier and the disengagement from its use as a guided association.
 A disengagement that gives the recipient a heightened awareness of the allover iconic imprint of our society of the „Iconic Turn“ by opening up new spaces of association. (Introduction see below)

Ruprecht Dreher, Peter Freitag

Oliver Ross, Marco P Schäfer

H C Petersen

Nicholas Kashian

INTRODUCTION Dark Matter, the known unknown. An encompassing, unknown structure in which the known is sporadically flashing like peripheraly-filed engrams. Dark Matter constitutes 84.5 % of the materia of the univers and it eludes our perception. The visible materia that is fundamental for our perception is formed by hypothetic forces. With the iconisation of public space by „architectural icons“ and advertisments, the meaning and form building forces of social functions and social discourse fade into the background. An orientation towards form and a turning away from shaping shows up. The outstanding is not outstanding in its function anymore, but in its form–its symbolism.The world that occurs is imprinted by marketing and capital interests. It should be mentioned that art is part of semiocapitalistic industries. Signature pieces in signature rooms are standards in art marketing. The exhibiting artists use products of semiocapitalism as basic material for their deconstructions. Magazinpages, advertisements, porn, posters, quickly consumed iconic content on ephemeral material. The artists erase, cut out, recombine and displace both formally and contentwise. Porn without sex, adds without products, polaroids without photos. Icons become patterns and patterns become icons. The signature piece steps back behind the method of making the not seen, the ephemeral and accidental visible. Structures and patterns behind the icons, the message, emerge and open spaces of perception and free association.

Thanks to Galerie Kuhn & Partner for support!

Pavillon am Milchhof, April 2016

The exhibition showcases the works of Awst & Walther, Alexine Chanel,
Jörg Hasheider, Viola Kamp and Daphna Reves. Media are (video)installation, painting and photography.
The mutual aspect of the works is their occupation with the perception of individuals and the change of individual perception in a surrounding that is determined by digital data flows – a discursive and poetic self-assertion of uniqueness in the days of
data-mining and self-optimization.

introduction

With  the still rapidly growing possibility of capturing and analysing huge amounts of data and the growing availability of data from on-line trading and on-line
communication, the providers of services and producers of goods obtain insight into the individual behaviour of consumers. These consumers are subsumed into relevant or
non-relevant groups and recieve specially created or modified offers.
Aside from commercial aspects, the surveilance of citizens by state-run agencies was
largely discussed in the context of the information revealed by Edward Snowden.

Questions occuring in this context are:

— what remains of our ideas of individual freedom and uniqueness being subjected to
those processes?
— what is the methodology behind the subsumption of individuals in groups of specified
consumers or suspects and how is it influencing our lifes?
— are the binary codes, that push these processes, the base of a standardized and
codified perception of „world“?

In this discursive context the artists present works, that:

— grasp individual aspects and keep them autonomous,
— show the complexity of everyday life inter-actions,
— confront the uniqueness of individuals with their standardization and codification.

All rights by the artists, except „Biometric Painting“ by Awst & Walter and PSM Galerie.
Photographies of the exhibition by Alexine Chanel

Thanks to Markus, Heike, Hartmut and Frank Benno!

Supported by: Kunsthochschule Weißensee, Milchhof e. V. and PSM Galerie.

real running time of „drone age voodoo“: 58 min